Dear Anita,

I like the flexibility aspect of your post.  Very true.  Depending on how we are feeling, and level of distress we can make decisions.

I cancelled social plans this weekend as I need to rest and attend to some errands.  This was a good plan.  The old Cali Chica would have “handled” it all.  But why? And for what reason? None.

A point I want to add is that of habit.  The idea that caffeine is needed to function, is common in our society.  There are days I wake up where I don’t necessarily “need” coffee but would go for the cup out of habit.  Perhaps later that day I felt more wound up from this caffeine, perhaps my muscles more tense.  Perhaps no, and I would have felt that way anyway. Regardless, being aware of any habits of ours – is important.  Important on the healing path.  We are always evaluating and re-evaluating what works and doesn’t – aren’t we.

To me, my yoga practice has been immensely helpful.  Since moving here, back to NYC, I have committed to a regular yoga practice.  It has helped me in so many ways, head to toe, mind and body.  I am really enjoying it, and look forward to continuing this practice – and seeing even more benefits.  If I notice positive effects in 2-3 months, imagine a year!

I also find that this has become an important part of my day – or however often I go.  I look forward to it, and for the most part, I try not to exchange it for another activity – such as a hangout with a friend.  I try my best to preserve it.

In fact, when we talked about the No Attack conversation, that day I came home after yoga and attacked my husband.  I look back and see the story clearer now.  IT was not, of course the yoga practice, that put me on edge.  No.  It was cramming too much into my day.  Making me angry, angry at myself and the situation, and then rushing back physically and figuratively – and then bam – roar.  There goes the attack.

It doesn’t matter if I was doing yoga or karate, or nothing.  It was my state of mind.  Therefore, yoga, and talking here has taught me – that the frenzy causes distress.  It is not even necessarily the activities or the people I am around, but the frenzied state.  If I rushed to and from yoga daily, and rushed through the practice without breathing – would I be relaxed? Would it help my mental state? No.

But if I see it as not just an hour of exercise, but the reminder to unwind, to protect this time, and that before and after/to and fro – then it is an entirely different experience.

Dear Anita,

I did not know this old saying, but I like it.  It is true. There is no good that comes from rushing.

my dad used to say an old saying, in our Indian language – that roughly translates into “haste makes waste”

I realize I did not respect this “teaching” given that it was from him.  Interesting isn’t it.  I see that now I do respect the concept of “haste makes waste” because I have now learned it for myself, through my own experience.  Haste makes anxiety, and suffering.  Haste often may not seem to make waste, seems to make productivity and bonus – but over time it makes waste in that it creates the frenzied state.  The state that you highlighted above, that creates suffering in so many forms.

Dear Anita,

To add, I will look at last Friday.  We were out to dinner with 2 other couple, close friends of mine, and now ours.  A great time.

My husband and I spoke about this yesterday (same conversation as that including our walk). The concept that I “over-emphasize” and over appreciate what others do/are doing/are.  AT the dinner I made it a huge point that my friends were moving to Florida and they got great jobs.  I went on and on about it.  To the friends it probably seemed normal, Cali Chica being nice and supportive.  I went on and on about it on the way home too to my husband, emphasizing how great it is for them…and looking back it was “compulsive/obsessive”

See Anita, if it was my husband and I who were making this move (which ironically we just made a move) I would by no means be as “appreciative/amazed/happy” about it.

Second, and most importantly, my husband stated how this has always been so hard for him, and now become a sore spot – because it is as though no matter what I will appreciate that of others, and undermine all that he does for me.  All the love and support.  I forgot how he said it exactly but something along the lines of.  They can have 1% but you give it 1000% appreciation and amazement, but i do 1000x that, and I get 1% appreciation/acknowledgement.

• This reply was modified 5 years ago by Cali Chica.

Dear Anita,

exactly. exactly.

 it is about viewing others as superior to you, superior to you-and-your-husband

your husband cannot get himself out of that inferior lock he is in

It sounds like even the “compulsive note taking” and “over observation” falls under this.  It does.

hmm..where to go from here?

to add: (edited after submitted)

my mother spent a great deal of energy and grief “hating” this about her self.  “wishing” she was someone who could focus on “you and yours” but instead couldn’t. but she would wax and wane between feeling she had nothing to appreciate and so of course worshipped others – to the other extreme of “oh I have so much, but look we spend our time on other people, how wasteful” of course never having true awareness or the depth of this “dysfunction”

• This reply was modified 5 years ago by Cali Chica.

Dear Anita,

Yes, I do.  As I have mentioned before, I do not have that many vivid memories from childhood (or the thoughts from childhood). But I can say I remember a vague sense of this.

For example, my mother and I – our family, we would go visit someone (my cousin) who was  living in a lower-middle class apartment complex, kids outside, people walking around, perhaps more urban.  She would say “what’s the point of living in a nice big house like ours and be lonely, it is so much better to be here – around people.” So I would manifest this.  As I played outside with my cousins, and all her friends (as there were so many apartments and so many children) I wouldn’t want to leave.  I thought “this was happiness” and going back to my lonely big house was sad.

So yes, that is one example.  I can think of others.

Therefore, I do remember as a child thinking I wanted to be in the superior scenarios (and mine were inferior).